Main cast: Jeffrey Combs (HP Lovecraft), Tony Azito (The Librarian), Bruce Payne (Edward De Lapoer), Belinda Bauer (Nancy Gallmore), Richard Lynch (Jethro De Lapoer), Maria Ford (Clara), Denice D Lewis (Emma De Lapoer), David Warner (Dr Richard Madden), Bess Meyer (Emily Osterman), Millie Perkins (Lena), Dennis Christopher (Dale Porkel), Gary Graham (Sam), Curt Lowens (Mr Hawkins), Signy Coleman (Sarah), Obba Babatundé (Paul), Don Calfa (Mr Benedict), and Judith Drake (Mrs Benedict)
Directors: Brian Yuzna, Christophe Gans, and Shusuke Kaneko
When Brian Yuzna met HP Lovecraft’s work, it was less a match made in heaven and more a rendezvous in R’lyeh—because let’s face it, Yuzna isn’t here for highbrow literary adaptation. He’s here for the kind of outrageous body horror that makes you question your life choices. Remember Faust: Love of the Damned? Of course, you don’t. But if I remind you of the scene where a woman’s breasts and rear end inflate like a Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade float, you’ll go, “Oh, THAT movie.”
Necronomicon ambitiously digs into Mr Lovecraft’s vault of horrors, presenting three anthology tales wrapped in a frame story. It’s like your favorite box of chocolates… if the chocolates were cursed, slimy, and occasionally exploded into a shower of goo. While the stories may not always stick the landing, the ‘90s-style practical effects ensure your eyeballs get their fill of the grotesque. Let’s crack open this unholy book of tales.
The Library
Jeffrey Combs steps into the (suspiciously squishy) shoes of HP Lovecraft, infiltrating a monastery to get his hands on the titular Necronomicon. Picture Indiana Jones meets your weird goth friend who’s really into tentacles. Mr Combs is delightfully campy, chewing the scenery like it’s covered in eldritch butter. The frame story sets the tone: the Necronomicon is less a book and more a portal to some seriously bad decisions.
The Drowned
The opener, directed by Christophe Gans, is loosely based on The Rats in the Wall. Emphasis on “loosely”. It’s about a guy who learns a spooky ritual to bring back his dead wife and decides, “Sure, why not? What’s the worst that could happen?” Spoiler: everything. The plot is as thin as Mr Lovecraft’s patience with adjectives, but the practical effects are the real MVPs. You’ll stay for the ooze, even if you don’t care what happens to anyone on screen.
The Cold
Shusuke Kaneko takes a stab at Cool Air, and by “stab”, I mean “gives it a makeover with zero resemblance to the original”. This segment features Emily, the queen of damsels in distress, whose life is a perpetual tumble downstairs. She finds refuge with Dr Richard Madden, a man who needs bone marrow to keep himself refrigerated. Cue romance! Or… something like romance. The chemistry between them is colder than Richard’s serum, but at least there’s a homicidal housekeeper to spice things up. Once again, the effects department earns their paycheck, even if the story left me as icy as Richard’s fridge.
Whispers
Brian Yuzna wraps things up with the most gruesome and body horror-heavy segment. It starts with two bickering cop-lovers, Sarah and Paul, who can’t stop arguing long enough to avoid a car crash. Paul gets dragged into a creepy warehouse, and Sarah follows, only to meet a deranged couple and a parade of Lovecraft-ian monstrosities. This segment screams, “Forget cosmic dread; let’s make you regret dinner!” It’s gross, slimy, and unapologetically in-your-face. Sure, it leans more Saw than The Shadow Over Innsmouth, but at least it’s memorable, unlike the first two segments.
Necronomicon is a mixed bag of slimy delights and forgettable missteps. It feels less like a cohesive anthology and more like a brainstorming session where cosmic horror clichés were flung at a wall to see what stuck. The practical effects are the real stars, outshining a stellar cast of genre legends where even the bit players have CVs that read like a horror film festival lineup. The stories? Eh, they’re there. But you didn’t come here for riveting narrative arcs; you came for tentacles. So come for the tentacles, and… well, stay for the tentacles.
Three oogies out of five. Or should I say, three squelches out of five?
